January 16, 1984

A report by the American Friends Service Committee said Friday the State Department has systematically violated the ban on the sale of arms to South Africa. In response, State Department officials conceded some military hardware has slipped through license barriers, but denied the bulk of the sales was actually military in nature.

The study by the pacifist Quaker group said that between 1981 and '83 US companies sold $28.3 million in goods listed on the State Department's ''munitions list'' to the apartheid nation - more than the commerical military exportd to South Africa for the previous 30 years.